The Shared Chapter began with a dream I had carried quietly for a long time: to have a book club of my own.

I love reading, but I have always loved what happens around books just as much: the conversations after the final page, the wildly different interpretations of the same story, the characters you cannot stop thinking about, and that wonderful moment when someone says, “Wait, I thought that too.”

For years, starting a book club was one of those dreams I kept tucked away for “someday.” I wanted a community where reading could become something shared, but I never quite had the confidence to turn that idea into something real. Then, in August 2026, I finally decided that someday had waited long enough.

There is another reason books mean so much to me. Someone I loved deeply introduced me to reading, and that gift changed my life in ways they probably never could have imagined. The Shared Chapter is, in some small way, my attempt to pass that baton forward. Maybe someone will discover an author they never would have picked up on their own. Maybe a reluctant reader will find the book that makes them fall in love with reading. Maybe two people living thousands of miles apart will discover they have far more in common than they expected.

That possibility is what this club is built around.

One Book. One Day. Many Time Zones.

At the heart of The Shared Chapter is our monthly readathon.

First, we decide together what genre we are in the mood for. Then I disappear down the inevitable rabbit hole of reviews, recommendations, page counts and reading lists to find books that could realistically be finished in a day. I gravitate toward stories that are fun, compelling and difficult to put down. There is room in the world for serious and solemn books, of course, but our readathons should feel like something you look forward to—not an assignment you have to complete.

The community votes on the book. We vote on the date. And when readathon day arrives, we dedicate the day to reading together—from wherever in the world we happen to be.

But there is no race to the final page. A whole uninterrupted day of reading sounds wonderful, but life does not always cooperate. We keep our discussions spoiler-free for two weeks after each readathon so everyone has the chance to finish at their own pace.

Because the point was never to read the fastest.

The point is to read together.

More Than a Monthly Book

The Shared Chapter is still very young, and perhaps that is one of the most exciting things about it.

We began in August 2026 with just 34 members and our first readathon. We are still figuring out our traditions, discovering what makes us laugh and finding the little things that will eventually become our things. I do not want to decide what the personality of this community should be before it has had the chance to develop one. I would rather we create it together.

Between books, our small WhatsApp group becomes our little corner of the internet. We talk about what we are reading, share thoughts and play small bookish games designed to help members actually get to know one another. One of our first was Judge Me by My Bookshelf, where members were paired up and asked to guess which of their partner’s books they had loved the most.

Some ideas will become traditions. Others may be spectacular failures. That is part of building something together.

Because I do not want The Shared Chapter to become a group of strangers who happen to read the same book every month. I want members to know one another. I want people to feel comfortable speaking up, disagreeing about a book, recommending something unexpected or simply dropping into the group to talk about what they are reading.

More than anything, I hope someone joins because they have been missing this kind of community and, somewhere along the way, realizes they have finally found it.

A Book Club Without Borders

For a community of only 34 people, we already cover quite a bit of the map. Our members live across the United States, India, Germany, and the United Kingdom, and I hope that list keeps growing.

One of my biggest dreams for The Shared Chapter is to make that geography part of the reading experience rather than something we have to work around.

I want a member in India to introduce us to a story the rest of us might never have discovered. I want someone in Germany to bring us a book we might never encounter otherwise. I want members to bring stories from their countries and cultures to the group so that, over time, our collective bookshelf becomes bigger than any one person’s reading world.

There are far too many wonderful stories in the world to keep reading from the same small corner of it.

You do not need to read 100 books a year to belong here. You do not need an impressive bookshelf, a favorite classic, or a clever literary opinion. You do not even need to finish every readathon book on readathon day.

You just need to want to read.

The Shared Chapter is only at the beginning of its story. We don't yet know exactly what traditions we will create, which books will become legendary in the group, which ones we will collectively regret choosing, or which friendships will grow out of conversations that started with a simple, “What did you think of the book?”

And I think there is something wonderful about joining while all of that is still unwritten.

Because The Shared Chapter is not just a book club.

It is a place where we come for the books and, hopefully, stay for the people.